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I have a little problem. I'm addicted to cookbooks, food writing, recipe collecting, and cooking. I have a lot of recipes waiting for me to try them, and ideas from articles, tv, and restaurants often lead to new dishes. I started losing track of what I've done. So now I'm taking photos and writing about what I've prepared—unless it's terrible in which case I forget it ever happened.

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Monday, May 9, 2011

Everything about this is going to be quick. This salad was quick to make, and there aren’t many ingredients to discuss, but that’s why it’s worthy of mentioning at all. The recipe appeared in the August 2010 issue of Food and Wine as part of a story about speedy party menus. This really can be made in a few minutes time, and it really does taste more complicated than that. I believe the most challenging step in the preparation was slicing some green onions or maybe washing the arugula. But, if you arrange the salad on a big platter, it makes an incongruously grand presentation.

For the dressing, just whisk together some plain yogurt, cumin, minced garlic, lime juice, and white balsamic vinegar. Add rinsed and drained, canned chickpeas to the dressing and stir to combine. See, nothing is even remotely difficult here. Wash and spin dry some baby arugula leaves and arrange them on a platter. Top the arugula with the chickpea and dressing mixture. Slice some green onions and scatter them over the top of the chickpeas. Then, sprinkle about some roasted pumpkin seeds. That’s it, and you have a great-looking salad full of interesting flavors.

Certainly, you could use baby spinach leaves or some other kind of baby greens in place of the arugula if you were so inclined. However, since there are only a few things being put together here, they do all play important roles and arugula’s pepperiness mingled well with the cumin in the dressing. Interestingly, the salad looked huge spread out on a big serving platter, but that big platter was soon empty. Sometimes the best things are the easiest.

This salad is a keeper, Lisa. The kind of salad to make for unexpected company. I almost always have chickpeas in the pantry and yogurt in the fridge. I'd use pine nuts I guess, 'cause I always have those too!

Oh boy. I really wish I had checked in with you an hour ago. We just got back from Napa - tons of wine and rich food. Both of us wanted something light, flavorful, and healthy tonight. This would have been just the ticket!

I picked up some chickpeas to cook, so this would be perfect. I love cumin, but only in the Indian culture have I seen a passion for it as mine...oh btw my comments are turned off, just waring, if you have come by.

This looks fantastic! For some reason, salads scare me. I can never make a dressing to my liking- it's always too acidic or too bland. Hubs is a salad maestro so I usually leave it up to him. I think you've convinced me, though, that not even I could flub this one up!